Delhi government’s reply sought on norms to make arrests

New Delhi: The Delhi high court on Wednesday sought a response from the AAP government on a plea seeking framing of guidelines relating to arrest and summoning of any person to a police station.

A bench comprising acting chief justice Gita Mittal and justice C. Hari Shankaran issued the notice to the government and sought a status report in this regard within two weeks on a petition alleging police harassment, while threatening arrest. The court fixed October 10 as the next date of hearing. 

The petition, moved through advocates Nikhil Borwankar and Varsha Ranjan, sought a direction to the Delhi police to refrain from arbitrarily summoning any person to the police station over telephone unless important circumstances exist, which are recorded by the officer in writing. 

The court also sought a direction to frame rules and the time-frame regarding inquiry into allegations against an investigating officer in an investigation. 

The petitioner further claimed that despite joining investigation on various dates in a domestic violence case, his attendance was never officially recorded and he had to resort to filing of documents and obtaining receiving of the contemporary dates in order to prove his attendance.

“After the investigating officer (IO) refused to record his attendance, he (the petitioner) apprehended arrest on the pretext of failure to join the investigation and, therefore, moved the trial court for anticipatory bail and got the relief,” the petition added.

During the hearing of the bail application, the IO submitted that the petitioner did not join the probe, it said. The petitioner later filed a complaint with the senior police officers about the IO’s alleged misconduct and claiming that he (the petitioner) had misled the court.